Long-ish range repeater

[loic2003]

Hi all,
I need to extend a residential wireless network to a building across the street. Currently got a fairly basic router serving out an ADSL connection. My thought was to get a repeater to have a directional antenna on it to transmit to the building across the road. Nice and easy - I can hard wire it to the router and have it send the wireless.

Here's my question: in the 'recipient' building on the other side of the road I'd like a repeater with a directional antenna, but also an omnidirectional wireless network to be in place for people to actually access it.

Obviously possible to have two repeaters do this, but I was wondering if it's doable with the one unit. I seem to remember many years ago mucking about with DD-WRT that if I had two antenna on the linksys access point I had, I could set them to do different jobs.

Is it possible to have one directional antenna with, for example, an 802.11n link to it for the 'long range' network, then the second antenna to serve out an 801.11g network in the building opposite?

....or should I just but 3 repeaters to do the job?

TIA

 

[JackMDS]

Repeater cuts the Bandwidth into half.

You are better off using a Wireless Router configured as a Wireless client to get the signal and then feed it into a Regular Wireless Router.

In doing it so you actually building your own repeater with two Radios and thus No bandwidth cutting. A choice to use Directional Antenna on the Bridge and Omani on the regular Wireless router, and the capacity to install each unit in a location more suitable for its purpose.

 

[loic2003]

Ok, thanks Jack.

Any recommendations for some hardware that'll do the job quite nicely? I had a good experience with the older-style blue Netgear Prosafe kit a few years ago, but that was all 802.11g IIRC.

Linksys with DD-WRT firmware?

 

[JackMDS]

In general the receiving side depends on the source. I.e, it depends what you have at the source.

The Linksys line has No detachable Antennae, so you lose an option that might be needed for such project.

If you want to re-build the source too go with two of these.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16833320091

It is on the expensive side of End-User hardware but it is DD-WRT compatible (if any additional features are needed) has detachable Antennae and Dual Radio.

If want less expensive basic solution these might be very good for basic service.

DD-WRT, detachable Antennae, HighPower.

Only 300 Mb/sec., No dual radio, and No Giga switch


http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16833162033

 

[Zap]

How far of a distance are you going? How's traffic on that road?

If a lot of traffic, you may want to have antennas mounted high enough on the building to clear vehicles. For distance, you may want to consider directional antennas at each end, pointed towards each other.

What's the budget? There are commercially available point-to-point wireless bridges available that you just mount, wire up and they just work. Alternately you can roll your own, but will have to do configuration.

Just an example of a quick web search.

802.11A/N Wireless Ethernet Bridge $300

This "kit" includes both ends. You just mount the two enclosures (consisting of radio + directional antenna) where they can see each other. They come with PoE, so you just have CAT5 running to them. They are pre-configured to work "out of the box" after mounting them and hooking them up. They use the 5GHz range so no interference with typical 2.4GHz WiFi.

This Wireless Point to Point bridge operates as a transparent bridge. It is similar to an invisible Ethernet cable connecting your two locations.